Radioactive contamination and other environmental impacts of waste from nuclear and conventional power plants, medical and other industrial sources

In recent years, it has become widely recognized that there are a large number of sites around the world that have become radioactively contaminated as a result of nuclear fuel cycle activities; the use of radioisotopes in medicine, research, industry; or nuclear and radiological accidents. For some sites, fairly localized contamination has occurred as a result of specific industrial processes as, for example, contamination arising from radium luminescence plant operations or the storage or disposal of radioactive materials. For other sites, widespread contamination with radioactive materials has occurred following massive accidental releases of radioactive materials (e.g. the Chernobyl accident of 1986 and the Fukushima accident of 2011). The presence of such radioactive substances, either natural or man-enhanced (e.g. effluents and residues from coal-fired power plants), may pose undue hazards to human health or the environment and may require remediation. Therefore, proper a priori identification of radioactive releases at an early stage for planned activities or post-accident characterization of accidental releases is a requirement to reduce the radiological hazards to acceptable levels. This chapter aims to identify and estimate the radiological impacts on the environment from power plants and other facilities.